It's been a long road for System Center Service Manager, however, which was delayed several times because of development issues. Originally scheduled for a 2007 release, the three-year setback left some critics skeptical of Microsoft's role in the systems management market compared to competitors.

What Microsoft is doing is important, but there is a lot of high-level activity from other players that has been out there for many years. Richard Ptak Ptak, Noel & Associates

"What Microsoft is doing is important, but there is a lot of high-level activity from other players that has been out there for many years," said Richard Ptak, a principal at Ptak, Noel & Associates, a Nashua, N.H., consulting firm. "You have companies like IBM with a product that already integrates everything, and Microsoft is coming in behind where a lot of other people have already been before."

Microsoft blamed engineering and performance defects driven by consumer feedback from beta testers on the delayed release. "We knew this was going to be a new area and we were going to have to learn a few things," said Robert Reynolds, Microsoft Service Manager group product manager.

The initial Service Manager beta, formerly dubbed Service Desk, was released in 2007, followed by System Center Service Manager beta 2 in the fall of 2009.

The final product, System Center Service Manager 2010 was released early that year, equipped with a slew of help desk functionalities such as a self-service portal for problem support that feeds off Configuration Manager.

But regardless of Service Manager's ability to keep costs low and preserve IT resources, critics expect a slow adoption rate and a power struggle between Microsoft and other systems management solution providers.

NEW FEATURES

Knowledge-based risk management – Service Manager's configuration management database collects information from several sources for solution support while also evaluating risks associated with making suggested changes.

Central management packs – System Center Service Manager 2010 includes two management packs – Change Management and Incident Management – to help administrators control and customize the solution process.

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